Sacraments Outward sign of inward grace Session Two

Your symbol What does this refer to? Something? Somebody? Tangible and material – what is it like? In what way is this related to your experience? The story involved – what is it?

Your symbol cont Meaning(s) ? What does it stand for? What does it represent? What does it reflect? To whom is this significant? How (if at all) is this celebrated or recognised? What is its function in your life? How effective is it?

Community / cultural symbols What does this refer to? Something? Somebody? Tangible and material – what is it like? In what way is this related to our / your experience? The story involved – what is it?

Community symbols cont Meaning(s) ? What does it stand for? What does it represent? What does it reflect? To whom is this significant? How (if at all) is this celebrated or recognised? What is its function in your life? How effective is it?

Communal symbols and rites Remembrance Sunday Last night of the Proms Christmas Graduation ceremonies Bonfire night (link with story still there?) First Communion rituals etc

When symbols lose their meaning... The story is forgotten The meaning is diminished The symbol itself looses value The language looses currency

‘Revalorisation’ In the 70s – 80s our national flags seemed to become meaningless. Then they were adopted by football.....Now the flag of St George is seen everywhere when a big, international match occurs. The Monarchy? Has clearly become more effective as a symbol in recent years.

Symbols Are a means of communication They communicate without words They communicate at different levels They can have multiple meanings They cross time – bring the past back into the present

Symbols... They – Stand for – They represent – They reflect – They point to – What can you use flowers to say? MAKE A LIST

Symbols relate to a story We begin with our own experience. The experience produces a story. The story is passed on. Important stories become translated into symbols. Symbols reproduce for us what matters in our lives and help us to celebrate those things.

Ritual uses symbols Ritual is repeated symbolic activity Rituals are not ‘created’ by officials. They grow and develop out of the constant celebration of that story through symbol. The ritual re-tells the story and re-produces the meaning behind it through symbols.

Ritual divorced from symbol Slowly becomes meaningless and dies. Or is carried out for its own sake and becomes external and instrumental.

CONTEMPORARY UNDERSTANDING OF SACRAMENT like Augustine, begin with sign/symbol nature of symbol: like a sign, points to something else [Boff,] – participates in the reality it signifies – creates and expresses – demands a response – not arbitrary – more actions than objects – ultimately concerned with meaning, but meaning mediated through the tangible.

In the beginning The Church had the story of Jesus. It needed to pass on the story themes of new life, salvation, redemption, forgiveness, grace, mission, God’s love for people. It was used to the Jewish story, to celebrations which passed on this story and with symbols which conveyed its meanings.

In the beginning.... So the infant Church called on those symbols to communicate the new story of Jesus. Very early on, rituals of baptism and the fellowship meal were practised, rooted in old Jewish customs. The community used symbols and symbolic activity to express its identity.

Contemporary understanding of sacrament Religion = DIALOGUE between people and living God [Schillebeeckx, Christ the Sacrament of the Encounter with God, p. 3) Religion = personal ENCOUNTER with God religion ultimately RELATIONSHIP

Sacraments are symbolic activity concern is about relationship with God about expressing and creating that relationship a relationship that demands a response an active relationship, which provides ultimate meaning.

Leonardo Boff sacraments are evocative: they narrate an event, relate a miracle or describe a revelatory divine breakthrough in order to evoke in human being God's reality, behaviour and promise of salvation. sacraments are self-involving: since they are not just descriptive but narrative, evocative, they always involve people... setting up an encounter that changes human being and the world

Leonardo Boff sacraments are performance-orientated: they tend to alter human praxis and induce conversion. They summon people to open up and accept something that will become part of their actual way of living.

Contemporary the old division between sacrament and sacramental is not so clear in the broad sense sacrament is any true symbol of our encounter with God Thus CHRIST is the first sacrament the CHURCH is the second

Rahner Three things necessary for something to be a sacrament: – it involves the church on the level of the church's true nature – it presumes the church's promise of redemptive grace – it decisively engages the individual with the unconditional offer of salvation

Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults [R.C.I.A.] Rite to prepare adults for baptism C.I.C.C.A. Christian Initiation for Children of a Catechetical Age. – Post 7 till about 16 or maybe older. – Adapts process for children.

R.C.I.A. Is rooted in the life of the community Is a process not a program – Periods – Steps

R.C.I.A. Periods and Steps Period or Evangelization and Precatechumenate Step One: Rite of Acceptance into the Order of Catechumens Period of the Catechumenate Step Two: Election or Enrolment of Names Period of Purification and Enlightenment Step Three: Celebration of the Sacraments of Initiation Period of Postbaptismal Catechesis or Mystagogy.

Optional Rites during the Catechumenate Exorcism and Renunciation of False Worship Giving of a New Name Presentation of a Cross

Rites Belonging to the Period of the Catechumenate Celebrations of the Word of God Minor Exorcisms Blessing of the Catechumens Anointing of the Catechumens